This traveling merchant mainly sells hand-polished jewelry and other shiny things in the countryside. These goods are packed in bags and baskets. Xia De certainly doesn't expect to find any treasures among them. In fact, these things are indeed very common.
He only took a quick glance and knew there was no elemental reaction, but during the simple search, when his finger touched a round metal coin the size of a fingernail, he actually sensed a slight elemental fluctuation:
"What?"
The coin was so small that I was afraid it would drop when I picked it up. There was a number 1 engraved on both sides, and no other patterns.
Seeing that Xia De was interested, the merchant found all the same coins. There were 8 in total, all of which had similar weak element reactions, and they could only be detected by direct touch.
The merchant himself didn't remember where he got these things from. He gave them all to Shad, and Shad planned to take them back to see Old John, hoping that he might have really hit upon some good luck.
After bidding farewell to the enthusiastic traveling merchant, he was contented to take the cards and the small coins with him and Professor Boulanger to return to the camp near Crossroads Village to find Captain Rades. But when he returned to the west side of the tavern where he had just eaten, he found that some people had gathered together and seemed to be watching someone quarrel. From the sound, it was clearly Professor Boulanger.
Xia De hurriedly squeezed through the crowd and saw the professor and his two companions confronting two men wearing short shirts who looked like dock sailors. The noisy crowd around them had already made it clear what had happened. The two sailors had accidentally spilled their drinks on the professor's clothes. When the professor asked them to apologize, the sailors used insulting words to call the professor and his two companions "Southern Old Men".
"professor."
Shade shouted, leaving the crowd and coming to the professor. The professor and the two students didn't seem to be good at solving this kind of thing, so he nodded to Professor Boulanger, motioning him to handle it, and then said to the two sailors:
"Gentlemen, this is a dining area, let's resolve this peacefully."
The sailor took a look at Shad's attire and his body shape, and determined that he did not look like a bodyguard or a boxer:
"How can you, a Delarion native, hang out with the old Southerners?"
Their statement was agreed by many people around them.
"So what do you want?"
Shade asked again.
"You compensate us for wasting our time. Then get out of this bar. You are not welcome here. Otherwise, we can talk some sense with our fists."
As he spoke, the short sailor clapped his fists twice, which made the onlookers even more excited, instigating the two sides to fight. The bartender who came after hearing the news wanted to dissuade the sailors from their behavior, but was stopped by the taller one among the sailors.
Professor Boulanger behind Shade was a little embarrassed, but Shade didn't care at all:
"That's what you said."
As he said this, he walked over. The sailors didn't expect him to be so bold, but they were not afraid of Shad.
The two men also rushed towards Xia De, one punched Xia De in the face, and the other raised his leg and kicked Xia De in the stomach. Xia De, who could even see the flying bullets, turned his head neatly to avoid the fist, then raised his leg and kicked away the leg that was kicking him.
As the sailor who was covering his leg fell to the ground screaming, another sailor tried to retract his fist, but was caught by Shade. The sailor tried to pull his fist back, but found that Shade was incredibly strong.
"You asked for it."
Xia De twisted the opponent's fist suddenly, let go, raised his foot, and kicked the second sailor to the wall. The whole process was very neat and clean.
"Professor, let's go."
He waved to Professor Boulanger and the other two, and then walked towards the door. After seeing what happened just now, of course no one dared to stop them, so Shade came to the outside of the tavern.
"This is the second bar fight I've encountered in the Green Lake area."
He thought to himself.
The first conflict was a southerner in the tavern at Crossroads Village who spoke rudely to the female owner of the tavern; the second time, a northerner spoke rudely to a southerner. Although they seemed to be trivial matters, if it weren't for the tense atmosphere caused by the negotiation and the emotions that were fanned by it, things might not have developed into a fight.
"Mr. Watson, I think we might as well just hire you."
Professor Boulanger came out of the tavern and followed Shad's footsteps. The two walked side by side on the muddy ground of the village, and the students followed behind them.
Shade shook his head:
"Professor, you can't afford to hire me. Oh, I mean, I have a lot of troubles to deal with. But your judgment is correct. If you and your students want to stay on the north shore of Green Lake for a long time, it is necessary to find some bodyguards."
The professor nodded in agreement:
"Now we can still walk on the land of Delarion. In a few years, maybe... ... no one can predict what will happen in the future. Let's go. What is going to happen will happen. Instead of worrying about this, I might as well think more about my own articles."
He was not frightened by the fight, but was a little depressed because of other things. Shade understood the professor's thoughts. After all, although the outsider lived in Delarian, he actually did not have any sense of belonging to Delarian. He liked Delarian more because of the girls of the Cavendish family.
So, he can judge the negotiation and its impact from an outsider's perspective better than anyone else.
"There is no such thing as good and evil, at least in my opinion, there really is none."
After leading the professor and his team to successfully find Captain Rads, Shad left. The captain did not resist the professor's request for help. He did not have much prejudice against the Carsenrick people, especially those who were willing to give him money.
As for Professor Boulanger's help in tracing the name on the pen, once he has the result, he will send a letter directly to the Green Lake Hotel. However, Shad did not hold out much hope for this kind of investigation. He still thought that Barry with rotten eyes might be able to give him some surprises tomorrow.
Because there was a long-awaited group activity tonight, Xia De threw away the crystal shoes and went home. He took a sip of pink essence and rested for a while. Seeing that it was still early, he took Xiaomia, who was enjoying a nap on the windowsill watching the pigeons, to deal with other things.
I don't know if it was Shade's illusion, but after Mia had been in the sun for an afternoon, her body temperature seemed to be higher than normal, and holding her in his arms was like holding a small stove. He thought the cat had a fever, but soon after leaving the sun, Mia's body temperature returned to normal, which was a magical phenomenon.
He took Mia to the Prophet's Association first, but this time he didn't ask Luvia for divination, but took the newly acquired Star 13 Dove of Peace, Kansas Mountain Talks to the Association for appraisal. Hearing that Luvia was very busy, Shade didn't go to see her specially, anyway, they would meet in the evening.
Then we went to Old John's pawn shop.
Ding Dong~
"Good afternoon, oh, Father Augustus?"
When he pushed open the door of the pawn shop, he saw an old man in a priest's robe talking to Old John at the counter. Hearing Shade's voice, Priest Augustus also turned to look at him:
"Oh, good afternoon, Shad. Let's leave together later. I think it's getting late. Let's go to the train station together."
"OK."
Father Augustus came to Old John to order a batch of special reagent bottles to store some ultra-high temperature liquids. After Father Augustus finished his business, Shade carried Mia to the counter. He put the cat on the counter and then arranged the eight coins the size of fingernails:
"Father John, can you help me take a look at what this is? It doesn't look like an ordinary item, but I can't find anything unusual about it either."
"Such a small coin is rare. You should understand that currency was invented to be used, and the size of the currency is therefore related to the size of the user's hand. Such a small coin is probably not used by humans."
He took out his tools to check, while Shade chatted with Priest Augustus about church matters. The delegation sent by Carsenrick to connect the negotiations had recently been keen not only on participating in the social activities of the nobles in Tobesk, but also on visiting the Five Gods Church in the diocese.
The priest received more than one "distinguished guest" and thought they were not very pious:
"They all come with their own goals. I have never been in favor of using the church as a social venue."
Old John's inspection took a full twenty minutes. When he took off his retractable brass mechanical monocle, he picked up a towel beside him and wiped the sweat off his forehead:
"That's what I thought. Why is it so strange? Detective, you may be disappointed. This is not a coin at all."
"What? But what else can something round with numbers on both sides be but a coin?"
Xia De asked in surprise. The old man behind the counter took a look at the cat Xia De was petting and gave an appropriate example:
"Your cat has two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears just like us, and it is also made of flesh. Could it be that your cat is also a human? Detective, don't let your habitual thinking mislead you."
He stacked the eight small coins together:
"This thing is very rare, and I have only heard of it."
He opened the thick book he had just brought from upstairs, then turned it around and pushed it to Xia De:
"That's it. Although it looks different from what's recorded, its function is the same. It's a relic derivative, and it's an angel-level (level 1) relic derivative."
Shad, the interested priest Augustus, and Mia all leaned over, and Shad read out the words in the book.
"Angel-level relic Feynman's gold storage warehouse. This relic looks like an ordinary warehouse and cannot be opened in the normal way. Any attempt to open the warehouse will cause the relic to go out of control. Specific description information is omitted. Every natural day, you can find a varying number of standard square, circular, equilateral trapezoidal or isosceles triangle metal pieces in the door crack, and there are numbers written on the surface of the metal pieces. The relic derivatives are numbered with numbers.
The characteristics of this type of relic derivative are as follows:
Metal No. 1, after spiritual resonance, can be shaped and manipulated by the ring magician, changing color and shape, but other physical properties cannot be changed. This feature becomes invalid when away from the manipulator;
Metal 2, upon contact with any metal, it is transformed into that metal, and has been proven to be effective against extraordinary metals such as Mithril;
Metal No. 3, after continuous consumption, there is a chance to obtain the Metal Iron Hard Spirit Rune, and there is a very small chance that the internal organs will be irreversibly transformed into metal;
Metal No. 4 is mixed and calcined with pig iron in a specific ratio to make a telepathic alloy;
Metal No. 5. Once Metal No. 5 appears, any metal objects within three miles of the containment area must be melted down within 24 hours;
No. 6 metal, omitted. "
"Is this a location-type relic? If I remember correctly, it was taken in by the Church of Creation and Destruction, right?"
Father Augustus looked up and said, and Old John nodded:
"Yes, there are rumors that this relic is actually an evil seal created in the Second Age. The warehouse actually holds something that we cannot describe. I also know more news. Metal No. 5 is called 'wisdom metal'. Once it appears, it will give souls and wisdom to any five metal products within three miles. It is also extremely malicious towards humans. Metal No. 6 is related to the relic itself. Once it appears, it means that the things in the warehouse are about to come out."
Father Augustus was not surprised that Old John knew so much, but Shad was more concerned about his eight small coins:
"I thought they were eight special coins... But it turns out that's not the case."
He followed the instructions in the book and used his mental power to resonate with the eight coins. Then, Mia saw the eight stacked round coins merge into a cylinder, which flew into the air, then changed shape and color as if it had melted, and finally turned into a blooming metallic gradient red rose. With Shad's mental interference, the gradient color of the flower changed from long wave to short wave in the visible light spectrum, and after turning purple, it changed back to the long wave band.
"It doesn't seem to be of any use."
Xia De said regretfully, and the old man behind the counter nodded:
"Your mental power is really strong... What do you think this can be used for? It's just a relic derivative, and it can't even be considered the main feature of the angel-level relic. However, you can use it to copy other people's metal keys, or hide it on your body to temporarily turn it into a blade, or when you can't find a sewing needle... Some ring sorcerers who are good at manipulating metal like this kind of thing very much... I won't charge you for the appraisal fee. It's so cheap that I'm too lazy to give you the change. It will be counted together with the next time."
Shade nodded. He had the key to the door and the ability to turn objects into toys. He didn't really need this derivative of the angel-level relic, but he had already thought of how to deal with it.